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Business
These case studies highlight researchers fostering partnerships with business
and industry to achieve economic and societal impact. Researchers working in partnership
with business will help ensure that we generate innovation and commercialisation
of ideas for growth.
Professor Martin Bache: from the University
of Swansea emphasises the importance of thinking
about the knowledge exchange and impact that occurs
from the flow of people from research into industry
and vice versa. An important route to commercial
impact has also been his close working with Rolls
Royce.
Ian Lazarus: at the STFC Daresbury Laboratory
provides technical and engineering support to nuclear
physicists. However, the work of him and his colleagues
at the Nuclear Physics Group (NPG) has potential
impact beyond his field and applications to the
medical and security industries. Further collaborations
have resulted from networking which means a new
technology in development may help improve future
diagnosis of cancer.
Professor Nick Jennings: is from the University
of Southampton and has led an award winning project
with BAE Systems which has generated a number of
patents and technologies. Success has been due to
the constant and regular cooperation and communication
with the users of research to ensure research outputs
were applied effectively and to steer the direction
of the research.
Professor Lucio Piccirillo: from the University
of Manchester highlights how talking to people outside
of his own discipline of radioastronomy has led
to many impact opportunities. He encourages other
researchers to talk to researchers outside their
field when completing their Pathways to Impact and
highlights the value of building up a network of
contacts.
Professor Rhodri Williams: from the University
of Swansea changed the direction of his research
from the rheology of industrial engineering fluids
to rheology of blood coagulation through a chance
meeting. As a result, Swansea is now seen as a world-leading
centre in this field and him and his colleagues
have two spin-out two companies, and are having
a clinical impact in local hospitals. He now regularly
engages with a wide variety of users including the
general public, as the feedback he receives from
them has been invaluable to his research.
Professor Nick Tyler: from University College
London researches how people interact with the environment
which has led him to set up the Pedestrian Accessibility
and Movement Environment Laboratory (PAMELA). To
maximise the impact of his research he has engaged
with users and the public which has led to a collaboration
with Thameslink2000 train link in London which has
had national impact for train design in the UK.
Professor Dek Woolfson: Professor Dek Woolfson from the
University of Bristol advises against writing the pathways to impact
at the end of the grant proposal. He suggests populating it with
headings and sub headings for each area where there is a potential
impact. Professor Woolfson’s impact activities are very much focussed
on building the research capacity of the next generation, helping
to lay the foundations for better engineering of biology and engagement
with the public. He believes that public engagement encourages an
understanding of his science from different perspectives, which
in turn has a positive impact on his own research.
Dr Stephen Cavers: Dr Steven Cavers at the NERC centre for
Ecology and Hydrology led a project studying the process of evolution
in pine trees native to the UK, which aims to help commercial growers
produce stronger, more resilient varieties of pine trees. Dr Cavers
has established contacts with Forest Research, the Forestry Commission’s
research arm, which communicates with a wide national network of
tree planters to understand what research stakeholders consider
important; he has also implemented a skills development plan to
improve the communication skills of the project researchers and
to proactively create opportunities to interact with end users.
Professor Davey Jones: Professor Davey Jones’ project together
with the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) investigated the greening
up of the Antarctic; they looked at the relative efficacy of Antarctic
hairgrass at absorbing organic nitrogen from the soil compared to
the mosses that grow alongside it. Professor Jones initially struggled
to identify users for the pathways to impact but realised that climate
change policy makers would benefit from the research. Professor
Jones arranged for a post-doc student to be seconded to the UK Polar
Regions Unit in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office for two weeks
each, in years one and three of the project to build links and to
understand policy makers needs for research and knowledge exchange.
John Methven: Mr John Methven’s project at the University
of Reading aims to improve the reliability of weather predictions
in the tropics. Mr Methven believes that building the time commitment
of an experienced KE facilitator into the proposal helps to make
the delivery of impact activities more efficient and effective.
Mr Methven has found that thinking about pathways to impact has
changed the way in which his research is designed and helps him
to think about how to communicate with stakeholders and to a wider
audience. As a result, the MET Office and the European Centre for
Medium-Range Weather Forecasting are now official project partners,
speeding up the utilization of the new theory to improve weather
forecasting models in the tropics.
Professor Alan Smith: Professor Alan Smith, Head of the
department of Space and Climate Physics at the University College
London’s Mullard Space Science Laboratory (MSSL) aims to create
an environment where his work studying the sun and processing huge
amounts of data can be applied in a variety of industries. Professor
Smith recognises that opportunities for interaction with industry
come about in many ways and he spends a lot of his time engaging
with industry and he also provides a broad training programme in
systems engineering.
Professor William Gaver:
Dr Irene Miguel-Aliaga from the Zoology department at the University of Cambridge has found that working with multiple age groups is a major challenge, but that it has unexpected benefits and appears to hone and focus the communication skills of the presenters.
For Professor Gaver his research impact is about propagating innovative ideas to use technology in everyday life. This involves embodying fundamental research about peoples’ values and activities in designs that are highly unusual but still appealing. “We make things that work – highly finished prototypes that work technically and aesthetically and also experientially. We engage with emerging technologies. Where we speculate is challenging how people engage with them.”
Dr Michael Pocock and Dr Darren Evans:
Dr Pocock, and his colleague Dr Darren Evans are responsible for a highly successful citizen science project, the Conker Tree Science Project, supported by the NERC. The project involves thousands of people around the country; has spawned its own smartphone app (the LeafWatch app), which reached number 1 on iTunes education downloads; and has generated masses of national and regional TV and radio coverage.
Professor Martin Siegert:
Professor Martin Siegert, Science Programme Director at the Sub-glacial Lake Ellsworth Consortium explains that economic exploitation of the Antarctic is forbidden under the international Antarctic Treaty, yet the project has created unexpected opportunities for potential economic impact. The team have had to find new design and technological solutions to manufacture large drilling equipment which can be packed into shipping containers for safe transportation to the Antarctic. They have also had to solve the complex engineering problem of how to capture the lakebed sediment and water sample and get it back to the surface without contamination to the sample or the lake itself.
Dr Maggie Aderin-Pocock:
Dr Maggie Aderin-Pocock a senior space scientist at UCL has become a well-known broadcast commentator for space-related news making documentaries on space science for several channels.
“My science communication does have an impact on the work I do, especially if I have to drop everything for a TV interview; but the benefits are multiple,” she says. “Having someone with a media profile can be good for the company image. But there are also the transferable skills: the ability to take fairly complex ideas and break them down into something straightforward and communicate it to different levels of understanding is invaluable”.
Dr Paula Chadwick:
Dr Paula Chadwick, a gamma ray astronomer at Durham University understands that people are interested in black holes and mysterious cosmic particles. Along with other particle astrophysicists around the UK, she is involved with a national project called CORUS, which aims to place cosmic ray detectors in schools.
Professor Graham Moore:
New varieties of wheat will help to ensure there is enough food as the global population continues to grow. It was argued there was a breakdown in the pipeline going from fundamental science to exploiting this research, Professor Moore has devised a plan to repair this pipeline.
By involving breeders at an early stage of programme development and including them at each stage of the grant process, Professor Graham Moore from the John Innes Centre helped ensure the outputs would be relevant to them.
Professor Martin Gallagher:
Professor Martin Gallagher, from the Centre for Atmospheric Science (CAS) at the University of Manchester explained that on a small project it can be difficult to define who the beneficiaries will be. Having to come up with a Pathways to Impact has certainly made him think about impact activities that he would previously perhaps not have considered.”
Professor Andy Parker:
Find your unique selling point, that fascinating reason why you do your research, and find ways of conveying that enthusiasm to others. “Yes, spin-off companies are going to have an economic impact on society, but this pales into insignificance when compared with the economic impact that is generated by inspiring people to become scientists.”
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